


Free Range

by Wilde_Shade



Category: Transmetropolitan
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-21
Updated: 2009-12-21
Packaged: 2017-10-04 20:38:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wilde_Shade/pseuds/Wilde_Shade
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spider Jerusalem attends a peaceful assembly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Free Range

**Author's Note:**

  * For [OpheliaRising](https://archiveofourown.org/users/OpheliaRising/gifts).



 

 

The eyeball doesn’t actually pop between my teeth. It cracks and oozes a tiny amount of something with the texture and taste of puss. I spit it out on the sidewalk and glare at the vendor – which is about all I’m going to do. Never mind that the guy has the build of a fucking gorilla, but I’m pretty sure he has his stand rigged to deploy _necrotizing_fasciitis at the press of a button.

 

The vendor spreads huge hands in unsympathetic apology. “Nothin’ I can do, pal,” he drawls. “Farm down the road is all blocked off. That’s where I get my meat. Haven’t had a shipment in a week ‘cause of those yuppie activists set up camp there.”

 

I peel the breading off a second eyeball, trying to find some way to salvage it as a meal. I can see the vendor’s hand edging toward something shiny and button-shaped and, so help me, I’m too scared to ask for a refund. “Activists, huh?”

 

I probably would have frivoled the day away at the nunnery again, but activists sounded almost enjoyable. Besides, those older broads were starting to wise up to the bulge of a bowel disrupter beneath a habit.

 

I order a bucket of gray matter bits for the road. Brains get better with age. This is only true in the case of dead, deep fried brains, of course.

 

 

#

 

 

_Organ_ic Co. only dealt in health foods once; whole grain and bean curd and a dozen other gelatinous monstrosities that look like shit and taste worse. They sold it by the smog-emitting truck load to specialty stores for exorbitant prices.

 

The CEOs raked in a tidy sum. They could afford anything those corrupt little hearts of theirs could desire -- SMART drugs and Transient mistresses and vacation houses to store it all in.

 

And then Mr. Head CEO goes and dies of a heart attack. A good, old-fashioned, “Dear Lord! That fucker is out of shape!” heart attack.

 

His underlings get worried. Their little health food niche might be in trouble. They might have to cancel plans for that pink champagne swimming pool with the phallic statuary they wanted to put behind the vacation house. So some guy in marketing got clever with italics and _Organ_ic Co. was born.

 

See what he did there? Organic Co. _Organ_ic Co. Organic Co. _Organ_ic Co.

 

Oh, yes. These people deserved yuppie backlash. I hope those spray-on-tan, tree-fondling assholes have burned the place down.

 

They haven’t. Bastards.

 

“Mr. Jerusalem!” I barely hear my name being called over the chorus of car alarms heralding me from the parking lot – which is now cramped with SUVs I couldn’t have dreamed up in my worst hallucinations, outfitted with all manner of electronisized, chrome-plated crap that would have still been excessive had the vehicles been designed for deep space exploration.

 

Luckily, I’d brought along my special SUV-beatin’ crow bar. It has a special attachment for excising chrome-plated crap.

 

“Mr. Jerusalem!” the same voice repeated while I made a modest collection of hood ornaments on _Organ_ic Co.’s front lawn. Before I could turn around, something limp and clammy was rudely pumping my right hand. My (primary) masturbating hand. I need that hand.

 

“It’s an honor, Mr. Jerusalem, a real honor!”

 

I look at the limp, clammy man and he looks at me. He looks like limp, clammy men aught to look; fancy wristwatch, khaki shorts, flip-flops that are more expensive than flip-flops have any right to be.

 

“I’m Jeorge Mordroux and you, you’re Spider Jerusalem! You’re here to cover the story, no doubt. Our peaceful assembly.” He grinned at me, baring teeth that had been bleached to inhuman whiteness. I have to blink a few times as I experience a bizarre, oral form of snow blindness.

 

“Now that’s Jeorge,” he clarifies. “Jeorge – J. E. O. R. G. E. and Mordroux – M. O. R. D. R. O. U. X.”

 

He won’t stop smiling. I try to look away, but it’s impossible. The man has a mouth like a bug zapper.

 

“Now, I’m not in charge or anything… not officially – but, feel free to talk to anyone you like. If you’re hungry, there’s a-”

 

“Brought my own food.”

 

“Ah, well, that’s actually frowned upon. I mean we went to a lot of trouble setting up refreshments. It cost a lot of money. But if you already ate, you can always just buy a bottled water. They’re nine dollars, but five percent of the proceeds go to-”

 

I punch Jeorge, J.E.O.R.G.E. in his bug zapper mouth. He shuts up _and _stops smiling. That’s what I call win/win.

 

 

#

 

 

The peaceful assembly looks like a music festival. They’ve set out lawn chairs and laid out blankets. A few gung-ho “activists” with farmyard animal traits are warbling an out of tune protest song on _Organ_ic Co.’s front steps.

 

There are several booths set up; selling t-shirts and refreshments. I pass the one selling water for nine dollars a bottle on my way to a place in the shade.

 

“Do I know you from somewhere?” a woman asks the vendor, an unsmiling girl with tired eyes.

 

The tired looking girl hands the woman her receipt. “I’m a cashier at S-Mart most of the time,” she says with a shrug.

 

“Oh, yes! I donated money there once. For the blind – or was it the deaf?”

 

“We take up money for food drives…”

 

“Yes, yes, that was it!” The woman smiles and she must have a smile like Jeorge, because the girl recoils. “You might remember me. Anyone who donates can write their names on one of those little paper cans, right? You put them up on the wall, right?”

 

“Uh huh.”

 

“Well, they made me a plaque, for donating so much. I hear that put it up right near the door.”

 

“Oh.”

 

The woman seems offended that the girl isn’t taking more of an interest and leaves, tossing her receipt to the ground and muttering something as she storms away.

 

The girl follows the receipt’s decent with a dull expression then, suddenly, her eyes catch me. Her face lights up a little. She smiles and waves and I realize I recognize her from that column I wrote about the revivals hostel.

 

I don’t know the girl’s name. I don’t know a damn thing about her except that she and a few others spend their free time getting revivals reacquainted with life in the city. I interviewed her for a few minutes, but I don’t think she mentioned having a plaque anywhere or even a little paper can.

 

I wave back at her.

 

 

#

 

 

There are some designer trees growing along the sides of the _Organ_ic Co.’s main office. That’s where the kids are set up; tied on leashes and completely docile from the cough syrup their parents have dosed them with.

 

“For your allergies,” says a mother with a dairy cow trait. Her son takes a couple of pills from her black and white palm and washes them down with a nine dollar drink of water. “That’s a good boy.” She pats her son on the head, turns, and tromps back across the lawn.

 

I plant myself beside her son and the other drugged little twerps. The brat with allergies gives me a bleary sideways glance. He’s overweight and freckled. He has red hair and a face like the nurse pile-drove him into the floor the day he was born. He sniffs the air with his snub nose and eyes the paper bag I brought with me from the Long Pig vendor.

 

My journalistic senses are tingling. Something catastrophic is going to happen here soon, and it may or may not have anything to do with the fact that I’d tipped off the hunting/foodie activist nut jobs from Top of the Food Chain.

 

What the hell? I offer the kid some gray matter bits. It's the least I can do.

 

 

#

 

 

Never let it be said that Spider Jerusalem is a heartless bastard. Bastard? Yes. But I’d never let you scum out there die for my own amusement.

 

… well…

 

No, no I wouldn’t.

 

Yet.

 

Death rides a heavily armored pale horse – Top of the Food Chain’s fearless leader wore leather. Lots of it. Lined in the downy fur of unfortunate house pets. His boots were genuine stillborn baby-hide. He wore a glorious, fucking, codpiece made out of the foreskin of a – Hell, I don’t know. Do sperm whales have a foreskin? It could be that – Legend has it his hair is a toupee. The scalp of his first wife, or so they say.

 

He rolled into the parking lot on an armor-plated motorcycle; spiked rims spinning, muffler so loud it sounded like God himself snorting cocaine.

 

He’d brought an entourage; a big one. Several dozen burly men and women clambering around, over and, once, even through the SUVs in the parking lot. Each of them armed to their sharply-filed teeth. Each of them carrying no less than a dozen specialized licenses to kill.

 

Lucky yuppies, the riot squad arrived first. Unlucky riot squad, the feedsite listeners arrived before that. Their disappointment was palpable when they received orders from their superiors that curb-stomping was to be kept to a minimum.

 

It’s glorious, much better than the nunnery.

 

The riot squad descends, deploying non-lethal force with extreme prejudice. Beanbags fly amidst a hail of rubber, net-deploying bullets. The tired-looking girl starts shutting the heavy metal shutters on her stand. I can see her grinning. The woman with the plaque is making a run for the stand, making high-pitched pleas for santuary. The girl slams the last shutter shut just as the woman slows to try and climb inside.

 

People with pig traits, horse traits, goat traits, chicken, ram, panda they’re all being shot down and it’s fucking surreal.

 

Several members of Top of the Food Chain and their fearless leader break through into the chaos. For a second, I’m genuinely a little worried one of these doped-up kids is going to see daddy get his head blown-off – and while he’s wearing jackass traits, no less.

 

But the riot squad is in top form. Errant livestock shot. Its would-be hunters shot. A pissed off third party doing the shooting. No one is happy. It’s all very Zen.

 

“Hey, was this brains?” drawls the redheaded brat holding the empty bucket of gray matter bits. “Do you have anymore? I’m hungry.”

 

And partly because I’m feeling benevolent and partly because I just saw that heifer mom of his being manhandled into a pair of handcuffs, I untie his leash from the tree behind us.

 

“Come on.” I stand, tugging on the leash which tugs on the boy’s harness which tugs his inebriated ass into a standing, much more portable position. “I saw a diner just around the block. If we hurry, we can finish eating before social services comes to ship you off to your next surviving relative.”

 

“Yay.” the boy cheers in a vacant tone.

 

We climb through the barricades just as another riot squad arrives and the television news crews start to assemble. I light a cigarette. “I don’t know about you-” I begin with a smile, taking a well-earned drag. “-but I’m in the mood for a good, old-fashioned hamburger.”


End file.
